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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25911211">Holding Back The Years</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ind1go_ink/pseuds/ind1go_ink'>ind1go_ink</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Umbrella Academy (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Gen, Hallucinations, Heavy Angst, Night Terrors, Number Five | The Boy-centric, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Suicidal Thoughts, Whump</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-15</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 02:34:50</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,826</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25911211</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ind1go_ink/pseuds/ind1go_ink</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes reality is not all we perceive it to be.<br/>Sometimes dreams feel stronger than reality.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Dolores/Number Five | The Boy (Umbrella Academy), Number Five | The Boy &amp; Grace Hargreeves, Number Five | The Boy &amp; Reginald Hargreeves</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>48</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Holding Back The Years</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>It's Five-centric whump, but without the comfort at the end (because in the show he makes it back to his family! So there's your comfort!)</p><p>Comments/reviews/kudos are always welcome!</p><p>(Let me know if you want an addition to this, because I do feel there's a lot of potential here. I just ran out of writing juice.)</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Dead.</p><p>His siblings... Dead. And there's not a thing he can do… Except to travel back. Find a way to stop the world from going to shit. Turn back time, hold the wash of years at bay, so that he can fix what he's broken.</p><p>He must. There's no other option.</p><p>He must travel as far as he can, gather as many books as he can. Find the answer to his problem. </p><p>He starts at the Argyle Public Library.</p><p>Five raids the shelves, creates a central point from which he can operate. Books pile high around him, like the forts he used to build with Six in the library when Father wasn't around to berate them. He settles into his fort of knowledge, sitting like a rock, unwilling to lose hope.</p><p>Night falls over an eerily silent world - Five's eyes grow blurry as he pours over thousands over words, hundreds of pages. His frustration grows as each book fails to give him the answer he needs.</p><p>Eventually, with the strength of his limbs waning, his thoughts thick and slow, he throws his last book against a tumble-down wall with a curse. Rubble clatters around him, and in the deathly silence the echoes ring for miles.</p><p>"What am I going to do?" He mutters to himself, curling up on a pile of debris, shivering and all alone amidst the shell of what used to be his favourite place.</p><p>His eyes fall shut as exhaustion washes over him. Darkness envelops him.</p><p>"Five," It's a whisper, just on the edge of hearing. Five stirs, a frown passes across his face.</p><p>"Five, wake up." A little louder now. Five shifts, mumbles. Rolls over on the concrete.</p><p>An almighty crack of noise thunders across the sky, a sullen and tumultuous grumbling, like the beginning of a storm. Five bolts upright, his body electrified with fear.</p><p>It's Number Seven.</p><p>She's standing on a pile of rubble across the way, still a kid, but… different. Blood cakes her face, bruises cover her body. Her uniform skirt is ripped and tattered, fluttering in a non-existent breeze. Five can't make out her face, but his heart hammers away in his chest as he stares.</p><p>"Seven, what happened?" Five cries while the sky opens up around them into a swirling, silent, vortex. A bubble of roaring nothingness. She remains silent, standing at an awkward angle on the stones across from him so that Five can't make out her face in the dim light. Her arms hang limp by her sides.</p><p>He stands, runs towards her, wants to take her in his arms, feel her real - solid - against him. But his movements are slow, like he's moving through mud. Static fills his brain, and his tongue swells to fill his mouth so that he can barely breathe, let alone speak.</p><p>Seven's eyes light up as she stares at him, and they're hollow sockets filled with blood. "It's all <em> your </em> fault," She hurls at him, her hair whipped by the silent storm around them. "You killed me."</p><p>"No! No, I didn't," Five chokes out, tries to keep moving, tries to reach through time to save his sister. So small, so fragile. <em>There's never enough </em> <em> time </em>. His head pounds with the resonance of a thousand hammers. His breath comes in short, shallow gasps.</p><p>"You did," Her voice is low, soft. Almost gentle… Almost. But it's loud enough to rattle his bones.</p><p>"No, please," Five's voice cracks as shame floods his body. "Please, I didn't. I'd never hurt you!"</p><p>Seven points, her outstretched, pale, finger, like a portend of doom. Five follows the trajectory without thought, but not before a large, dark, shape appears out of nowhere, hurtling into him.</p><p>He's thrown to the ground, skull bouncing on jagged cinder blocks. Standing above him is an adult Number One, all bulky mass and shattered arms.</p><p>"It's your fault, Five." One repeats Seven's words. His voice is terribly loud, cutting through Five like ribbons.</p><p>Seven is floating behind him. A silent watcher. "<em> You're </em> the reason we're dead." They chorus together.</p><p>"Shut up!" Five screams, so loud above the silence of the storm raging around them. "Shut up! Shut UP!" He turns, makes to scramble away, the pounding in his head makes his vision spotty. His movements are stilted, raggedy. Like a puppet with no strings. </p><p>He gets an inch before he's picked up, held at One's eye level by his throat. One's face is puffed, purple with bruising, cheek split open and dribbling black blood.</p><p>"Your fault." He says through a mangled jaw. Five can see his tongue flapping through the hole in his cheek. Horror crashes over him, and Five turns his eyes away, unable to bear the sight.</p><p>"No!" Five struggles in his brother's immensely strong grasp, beats at One's hands ineffectually as his vision clouds over. It's so hard to breathe. "Stop it!" He rasps. "Let me go, you bastard!"</p><p>One turns his gaze to the side, tilts his head as if awaiting a command. Distantly, through thick fogginess, Five sees another four shapes surround them.</p><p>"Let me…" He kicks himself away from Number One, who releases his hold in the same moment. "GO!"</p><p>And then he's falling, falling in slow motion like an endless waltz, falling into a cold, aching abyss. His sibling's dead faces float above him, disembodied.</p><p>"It's your fault, Five." They intone in sync. All scraped up, bloody, and broken. "Your fault we're dead."</p><p>Five screams, the sound is cut off by a blanket of terror, choking him. Eating him alive.</p><p>A loud bang cuts through the whirling, raging storm inside Five's head and he startles awake. A hot beam of sunlight cuts through the rubble, hitting him directly in the eyes. Despite the heat, Five shivers uncontrollably, sweat drenching his frame.</p><p>He looks around, unseeing. Then the memory hits him like a punch to the throat, and he remembers where he is. <em> How </em> he got there. His teeth clatter together, and he clenches his hands into fists to stop them from trembling.</p><p>"It's just a dream." He murmurs to himself. Takes a deep, shaking breath. "Just a dream."</p><p>He shifts upright into a ball, clutching at his knees. "And I'm alone."</p><p>The first wave of panic starts to crash over him, reality setting in. "I-I'm alone."</p><p>He stands, blindly kicking his precious books out of the way. The impetus is to run, to force his way out. To escape.</p><p>So he does.</p><p>He runs, and tries to use his powers. Cursing when it fails him. The blue glow fades faster with each attempt.</p><p>So he runs, and tries again.</p><p> </p><p>And again.</p><p> </p><p>And again.</p><p> </p><p>And again.</p><p> </p><p>The panic nips at his heels, threatening to take over. He runs, runs until his clothes are soaked with sweat, and he can barely stand. Keeps trying, clenching his fists so hard that his palms bleed with little indented crescents. He hurls curses, and when that fails, pleads… begs at the reality that has him trapped to free him.</p><p>He stumbles to a halt outside a department store,  crawls his way over the collapsed entrance through a cracked space. Exhaustion takes him, and he slips as he skids down the other side, skinning a knee as he lands in a crumpled heap.</p><p>The pain throbs in time with his head, his chest feels like it's caving.</p><p>"What have I done?" He moans to himself, the panic setting into him with ferocious teeth. Ripping at his throat, digging its claws into his belly. He lets out a stifled sob, the first in his life, and clutches at his head. Slaps himself once, twice. "Make it stop!"</p><p>
  <em> You made a mistake... One that can be reversed. </em>
</p><p>The sound comes from outside - or is it inside? Five whips his head around, searching for the source of the voice. His salvation. Maybe he won't be alone. Maybe someone survived!</p><p>
  <em> I'm over here. </em>
</p><p>The voice calls to him, soft, and sweet. It sounds like saving grace. He doesn't care if it's an enemy, if it's even someone who doesn't know...who <em> wouldn't </em>understand.</p><p>In his haze, he crawls over sharp concrete debris, blindly feeling his way through his terror. The pain is a chorus in his head, along with the fear.</p><p>
  <em> Just a little closer. That's it. </em>
</p><p>He crawls past shattered racks of clothing, fabric torn to shreds, head down, focusing only on the voice. His hand hits a wall, and he sharply inhales, then dares to look up.</p><p>A mannequin is staring back at him.</p><p>
  <em> You found me! Congratulations. </em>
</p><p>He stands, shaking like a leaf. Approaches, then backs away. "What is this?" He asks himself.</p><p>
  <em> My name is Dolores, silly. I'm here to help you. </em>
</p><p>He gazes at her, lost and alone. Ears ringing with the hushed whispers of his dead siblings.</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>Your fault that,</strong>
</p><p> </p><p>
  <strong>We're dead,</strong>
</p><p> </p><p><strong>It's your fault,</strong> they sing.</p><p> </p><p>
  <em> Well, come on. We haven't got all day. Take me with you. </em>
</p><p>The whispers stop for a moment, and Five lets out a shaky gasp. He wants to cry in relief, offer up his soul for redemption in that moment - not that he believes in God. "Okay… I'll bring you with me."</p><p>His salvation.</p><p>Over the years, the nightmares begin to slow. Each time he wakes, shivering and ready to quit, to end it all, Dolores is there. He turns to alcohol to quiet the voices, the occasional flickers of the ghosts haunting his vision. Searches for caffeine to keep him awake until the light reaches him each dawn. It turns into a routine, scrawling numerical value after decimal point on the walls of his beloved library during the nights when he doesn't pass out from exhaustion. During the day, he goes on the hunt for more books, more information. Dolores, always by his side.</p><p>The quiet becomes a comfort.</p><p>The voices of his dead siblings grow silent the harder he tries to figure out the equations. The further he pushes himself to find a way home, the less he deals with the monsters in his head.</p><p>One night, when the bite of a nuclear winter starts to set in, and after a particularly lengthy conversation with Dolores, discussing - no, <em> arguing </em> - about where one niggly little decimal point should go; as his head hits the pillow, he hears a noise like shifting rubble.</p><p>He jolts upright, grabs his gun, and hauls it in line with his left eye. Despite the caffeine, and the alcohol, his aim is dead centre.</p><p>In the ensuing silence, he waits. His breathing coming in shallow bursts. He waits for an hour, never once lowering the gun. His arms shriek with complaint, his muscles shaking.</p><p>There's nothing there, though. Just small gusts of wind, echoing through the empty City. Just him, his gun, and Dolores.</p><p>As it should be.</p><p>His heart is the loudest thing around him, blood rushing through his ears.</p><p>He mutters an expletive to himself, slumping back down on the pillows he'd gathered from houses that hadn't been hit as hard by the apocalypse.</p><p>Sleep overcomes him, as he listens to the soothing singing that Dolores often blesses him with.</p><p>Hours pass, as do the stars overhead.</p><p>He wakes. Sleep clouds his brain, so that he doesn't recognise where he is. He feels for his gun, blindly. Grunts in surprise when he can't find it. Slowly, what lies before him comes into focus, and his breathing falters.</p><p>"Five!"</p><p>It's a call, echoing around the small room he's in, absorbed by the thin single mattress he's on. He pats around him wildly, blinking rapidly when all he can feel are sheets.</p><p>"What the fuck?" He murmurs, flinches when his door - his <em> bedroom </em> door - flings open. <em> Doors haven't existed for fifteen years... </em></p><p>"It's time to wake up, sleepyhead." Grace is standing in his doorway, all smiles, her floral scent drifting on the air. Five looks into her face, expecting death and decay. But he only sees motherly concern.</p><p>"Grace, where am I?" He asks distantly, hearing the sounds of the morning echo through the house.</p><p>
  <em> An honest to God house. </em>
</p><p>He can hear Number Three laughing, sweet as a doll. Number One and Two tussling in the hallway to be first up the stairs. Sheets are being shaken out, the rustling of clothes being put on.</p><p>"You're at home, Five." Her eyebrows quirk, and she tilts her head. "Are you okay?"</p><p>To dissuade her from conducting an examination of his vitals, he nods lightning-fast. Then gets out of bed, gingerly, expecting the hard crunch of dust beneath his feet.</p><p>Instead it's soft carpet. He wiggles his toes through the threads, a frown crossing his face.</p><p>"Where is everyone?" He asks, as Grace - having fulfilled her duty - turns away. She turns back, smiles again in that beatific, vacant way of hers.</p><p>"Why, they're all going to the table for breakfast. You'd better hurry. Your Father won't be pleased if you're late."</p><p>Five considers that statement, lets it digest as Grace leaves and he rifles through his wardrobe for his uniform. When he catches sight of himself in the mirror, his eyes narrow, jaw clenching.</p><p>He's thirteen again.</p><p>He whirls about as a knock on the door displaces his thoughts. "<em> Hurry </em>. Up. Number Five." It's Reginald, looking as stern as ever. And for the first time in fifteen years, Five doesn't know what to do.</p><p>"You are making the others <em> wait </em>." His Father snaps, turning on his heel and marching away.</p><p>Five hurries through pulling his clothes on, haphazardly patting his hair down as he follows along behind Reginald's staunch figure.</p><p>"Wait," He calls. Reginald doesn't turn around, but a huff of air tells Five that he has his attention.</p><p>"Such insolence will have to be punished, Number Five." Reginald doesn't stop, or wait, but Five knows that he's listening.</p><p>He always does.</p><p>"Why are you all alive?" Five hisses out. "I saw you, all of you. You all died."</p><p>Reginald stops, casts a glance back at his fifth adopted son. "What on Earth are you gibbering about?"</p><p>Five tries not to feel the paranoia mount, swallows back an expletive. "I jumped forward in time. And I saw us all die."</p><p>"What rubbish," Reginald scoffs. He continues walking, but Five makes to jump in his way, clenching his hands into fists, concentrating. To explain. To find out why he's back.</p><p>And he finds he can't.</p><p>"Oh." He tries again, but can't. There's nothing. No hum of electricity in his veins, no blue glow, no power flowing under his skin.</p><p>"If you don't hurry, Number Five. I won't let you observe the others' mission today."</p><p>Five's eyes widen. "Wait. That's not <em> me </em>." He chokes out, incredulous, past the lump in his throat. "That's Seven!"</p><p>Reginald doesn't stop moving, and the hallway seems to stretch on forever. "What do you mean 'That's Seven', you imbecile?!" Reginald's voice resounds in Five's ears with growing intensity, deafening him.</p><p>"Your sister has proven to be most adept at spatial jumping. <em> You </em> , on the other hand, have never had powers, and you never <em> will </em>." With that, Reginald turns to face Five with a click of his boots, his face a stormy monstrosity. "There's just nothing special about you, Number Five." He thunders, growing larger and larger as everything else shrinks.</p><p>Five steps back, grits his teeth. "LET ME WAKE UP!" He yells, and turns. Tries to escape. Everything around him disappears with the smallest of implosions.</p><p>A tiny <em> pop </em>.</p><p>He's alone, trapped in the dark, in the storm. He runs, in a direction, in any direction. But there's no escape.</p><p>"LET ME OUT!" He howls as his legs give out. He slams into the ground.</p><p>And wakes up.</p><p>Delores is sitting in her favourite spot, watching him.</p><p>
  <em> Another nightmare? </em>
</p><p>It doesn't even need to be a question, as Five pats himself down, pleased to find he's still in his twenty-eight year old body. His hand trembles as he reaches for a flask tucked under his pillows.</p><p>He can feel Dolores' disapproval as he gulps down the entire thing. Ignores her when she asks him when they're going to start calculating the quantum trajectory of the participle complex.</p><p>"Just," He sighs out after finding another dusty bottle of wine he'd tucked away. "Let me be."</p><p>She falls silent as he pops the cork, guzzling down as much as he can.</p><p>
  <em> You never listen to me, you know? </em>
</p><p>Five bares his teeth, throws the bottle without thinking and recoils when it smashes on a broken pillar. Dolores watches it all impassively.</p><p>"I listen to you just plenty," He hisses. "Let me have this one thing."</p><p>She tsks her disdain, and it sounds eerily like Five's Father's tutting. But now the alcohol has Five wrapped up in a warm blood blanket, and he finds he can hardly care.</p><p>"Let's get to work, shall we?" He stands, stumbles to his equations scrawled across the walls, squints at them.</p><p>
  <em> We've got a long way to go yet, Five. </em>
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